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Thread: Summerlands Before the Breaking

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    Community Leader Guild Sponsor Gidde's Avatar
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    Default Summerlands Before the Breaking

    This is a historical (centuries old) map of the prime material plane of the Planescape-ish world I'm building for a 4e game. A few years after this map was made (and despite the annotations it is indeed incredibly accurate), the War of the Covenant resulted in the breaking of the world and the retreat of the gods to their own plane permanently (yeah, I know, that particular concept isn't very original, but it's very handy for explaining ruins for adventurers to plunder). Next is the current map of the known world, and I may decide to get artsy with the planar structure and post that up eventually too.

    A few map-related factoids about cosmology/geology/etc.:
    • The world is indeed flat.
    • Light is provided by eight divine torches (one for each of the major gods of light). At regular intervals throughout the day, a torch is lit/extinguished, so time is measured by how many torches are currently lit, i.e. First Torch, Second Torch, ... Midday, .... and I'm still working on names for the segments of daylight, but that should convey the idea.
    • The nighttime sky has no stars or moon; instead it looks a bit like a constant, faint, multicolored Aurora -- without the blazing torches overpowering everything, the dancing/frolicking/working/blah-blah of the celestial horde is faintly visible.
    • The torches are centrally placed with respect to the material plane, so from any point not directly in the shadow of a mountain/building etc. one can clearly see all 8 torches (if lit). They're basically stationary, miniature suns. When the cities of the gods were directly beneath them, the gods kept the innermost lands from being blasted by the heat, but this is no longer the case. Now the land directly beneath the torches is pretty much scorched.
    • Wind and weather are at the mercy of the gods, their lieutenant demigods, and elementals coming to the material plane to play.


    The cities and roads will gain labels as I work on the next map (after the breaking), and the whole thing needs aging. Annotations will also get added as I work on the rest, but this is done enough to post, I think. Everything so far is today's work, using the quickie methods in my hand-drawn tut.

    Comments, suggestions, questions etc. are always appreciated!
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    Guild Master Facebook Connected jtougas's Avatar
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    Incredible !!
    I am the breath of Dragons...The Song of Mountains...The Stories of Rivers....The Heart of Cities.... I am A Cartographer....

    Finished Maps
    Kingdom Of Shendenflar Campaign Setting (WIP)

    Everything I post is free for use and redistribution under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 licence, except where noted otherwise in the thread.

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    Community Leader Guild Sponsor Gidde's Avatar
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    So after the sketch of the world before the breaking, time to break the world. These two keys show the pieces of land and where each piece is before and after the breaking. The after pieces will erode/etc. into slightly different shapes and in many cases break apart further, but they'll stay put from here. Now to actually start the real map!
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    Guild Adept moutarde's Avatar
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    Very cool! Looks like it will be a fun project to work on

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    Community Leader Guild Sponsor Gidde's Avatar
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    Thanks guys!

    Ok, I'm at a point where I need to ask for input. Since the major (only, really) reference point is in a fixed position in the center of the map, my thinking is that the map itself should move to orient on that point. So each landmass would be drawn with "up" pointing at the center .... and all mounted on a pivoting plate something like the following below.

    What I'd like to know is, do you think I'm barking up the wrong tree? If not, does it need more hardware? (Other than a decent background of course.) I'm thinking there should be clips around the edges to non-destructively hold the map to the plate, but I can't for the life of me figure out how to draw them. Having ideas that are WAY beyond our ability to create is how we grow, right?

    As a sidenote: If I do end up doing it this way, I'd probably wrap it in Java or Flash at the end so that someone viewing it could actually pivot the thing.
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    Community Leader Facebook Connected Ascension's Avatar
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    I think that's called a polar-centric view - I'm sure those who really know the tech stuff will know the name - so, no, it's not crazy. As for holding the map to the plate - you could use tape, push pins, paper weights, or just let the edges curl up.
    If the radiance of a thousand suns was to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the Mighty One...I am become Death, the Shatterer of worlds.
    -J. Robert Oppenheimer (father of the atom bomb) alluding to The Bhagavad Gita (Chapter 11, Verse 32)


    My Maps ~ My Brushes ~ My Tutorials ~ My Challenge Maps

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    Community Leader Guild Sponsor Gidde's Avatar
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    Thanks Asc ... I think I'm going to go with an outer clip ring, and model the whole apparatus after an old-school astrolabe, those things are fascinating.

    The bad news is that I've relapsed a bit, so the project will be on hold for a bit now

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    Administrator Facebook Connected Diamond's Avatar
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    Oh man... don't say that! Tell your back to get off your back! Must see more of this project! MUST!

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    Community Leader Guild Sponsor Gidde's Avatar
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    Hehe. Well I went to the doctor today and he confirmed that it's just a minor relapse. And my hubby's getting me tools so I can work on it on paper in bed ... so hopefully when I can get back into gimp in a few days I'll have some good stuff to post

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